RANSOMWARE ATTACK HOBBLES ALLSCRIPTS' ELECTRONIC
PRESCRIPTION SERVICE: A ransomware attack on US
electronic health records (EHR) company, Allscripts, has led to
lost revenue and operational headaches for physicians, according to FierceHealthcare.
The attack on two of Allscripts’ data centers in Raleigh and
Charlotte — both in North Carolina — was still affecting
physicians' ability to do their jobs six days later. However, the
company says that of the 1,500 clients affected, none were
hospitals or large independent physician practices and no patient
data was stolen.

The attack heavily impacted patient care.
Affected physicians were unable to use the electronic
prescription for controlled substances service, and lost access
to electronic medical records (EMR), appointment systems, and
billing systems. Other applications such as clinical decision
support, analytics, data extraction, and regulatory reporting
were also down. All affected systems are expected to be up and
running by the end of the week, according to Allscripts privacy
and security counsel Robyn Eckerling. Allscripts is one of the
largest EHR systems in the US, supporting more than 180,000
physicians, with 100,000 electronic prescribing physicians, and
around 40,000 in-home clinicians in the US.

Data breaches are a huge cause of concern for healthcare
organizations. More than 95% of critical care
hospitals and over 92% of regular hospitals in the US have
implemented EHR systems, according to Definitive
Health. That makes them targets for cyberattacks. Besides putting
patient data at risk, data breaches can also be a significant
financial burden on medical providers. In early January, Hancock
Health Hospital paid ransomware attackers the equivalent of
$55,000 to recover their systems,
according to CSO.

Some medical providers were able to lessen the damage
from the attack by switching to internal servers. Taking
a hybrid approach to EHR — where providers use a combination of
external and internal data servers to store patient data — could
mitigate the harm of future attacks. For instance, Sunflower
Medical Group, an Allscripts customer that uses an internal
server, still had access to its patients’ EMR. And Northwell
Health in New York switched to their internal servers to protect
patient data, however, they lost access to Allscripts’ electronic
prescribing of controlled substances at its 23 hospitals and 660
ambulatory locations.

MICROSOFT SHUTS DOWN ITS HEALTHVAULT INSIGHTS
PROJECT: After launching last February, Microsoft has
already decided to scrap its app-based machine learning
research project, HealthVault Insights, according to HealthcareITNews.
The app, which compiled health data from various sources,
including other apps, devices, and medical records, enabled users
to access and analyze their personal health records. This data
was also used by providers to gain a better
understanding of patients' health, drive care
plan adherence, and encourage patient engagement. Microsoft
didn't provide much insight into its decision, but poor app
performance may have been a contributing factor — the app had a
rating of just 2.2 out of 5 in the iOS App Store.
Although this project has been shut down, it's possible that the
tech giant will reallocate resources to other healthcare
projects, as part of its Healthcare NExT program. Microsoft
launched Healthcare NExT last year to accelerate
innovation in the healthcare industry by using
advancements in artificial intelligence and cloud computing.
Since then it has launched several projects, including a chatbot
platform for healthcare providers and a project that is
aiming to sequence the immune system.

FLORIDA HOSPITAL NEW SMYRNA PARTNERS TELE-ICU SERVICE TO
IMPROVE PATIENT CARE: Florida Hospital New Smyrna has
partnered with tele-ICU company Advanced ICU Care to launch a
telemedicine service for its intensive care units (ICU), according to HIT
Consultant. Florida Hospital’s ICU clinicians will have 24/7
access to US board-certified intensivists — physicians who
specialize in emergency care — via Advanced ICU Care’s
telemedicine platform. Having around-the-clock access to trained
critical care physicians could help reduce mortality rates and
decrease the length of stay, as well as improve patients'
experience and outcome. In some instances, tele-ICU programs have
also been shown to increase the volume of cases ICUs can handle,
in turn leading to improved contribution margins. A 2017 study by UMass Memorial
Medical Center found that the Philips telehealth eICU Program
increased case volume by 21% and improved contribution margins by
376%, compared to pre-tele-ICU implementation figures.

MERCK TO PILOT DIABETES PREVENTION PROGRAMS IN
PARTNERSHIP WITH BLUE MESA HEALTH: Blue Mesa Health, the
North American digital therapeutics
company,
announced a partnership with Merck KGaA, the German-based
health firm, to pilot its Diabetes Prevention
Programs outside of the US. As part of the
pilot, Merck will give diabetes patients access to Blue Mesa
Health's Transform program, which includes remote
health coaching, a peer support group, and a smartphone app
that's connected to activity trackers. Giving patients the
ability to manage their diabetes will enable Merck, which is
considered a leader in diabetic medicine, to move beyond
pill-based therapeutics and into health management. Diabetes
is one of the most prevalent chronic illnesses in the
world — there are 451 million people diagnosed with diabetes
globally, according to Fortune. As for
Blue Mesa Health, which offers its solutions in the US and
Canada, a partnership with a healthcare giant that has a presence
across the globe could help the firm build out a significant
international footprint.

In Other News…

Google came under fire after it tested a
Google Maps feature that calculated the calorie counts of
walking routes and conveyed it as the equivalent number of
mini-cupcakes eaten, according to MobiHealthNews.
On the other hand, some social media users applauded the idea
as one way to use popular tech devices to encourage healthy
lifestyle changes.

The Enhanced Nurse Licensure
Compact(eNLC)
came into effect January 19, enabling licensed nurses in 29 US
states to use telehealth and treat patients in other states
without multiple licenses, mHealth Intelligencereports. The eNLC rollout follows almost a year after the
Interstate Medical Licensure Compact for physicians came into
effect in April 2017, giving eligible physicians the ability to
practice across state lines without having to get multiple
licenses.